


and we are far from home

by vontsira



Category: Kingdom Hearts, Subarashiki Kono Sekai | The World Ends With You
Genre: Gen, Mentioned Riku (Kingdom Hearts), based on the kh3 secret ending but it has so much twewy focus tbh im tagging it as well, slight joshneku ft. joshs lil crush
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-11
Updated: 2019-03-11
Packaged: 2019-11-15 10:05:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,201
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18071327
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/vontsira/pseuds/vontsira
Summary: Hanekoma hums. “Alright, I’ll bite. What makes this guy so special?”“You could say that he’s not from around here.” Josh giggles and his smirk returns, teeth flashing.





	and we are far from home

The bell chimes of WildKat’s front door chimes softly, marking the start of Hanekoma’s admittedly slow “work” day. “Just a minute,” he shouts from the overly small and probably unsanitary dusty backroom, hidden behind a creaky old wood door connected to the backside of the building. Unlike the rest of WildKat the room is dark and dreary and without a spot of color and devoid of any personal touch. Hanekoma makes his way through the door and into main room swiftly, ducking under the head of the door frame with a practiced familiarity.

As his luck would have it his first and probably only customer of the day is none other than Josh Kiryu. Hanekoma has a soft spot for kid- maybe more than a spot, really, but the look on Josh’s face bespeaks of trouble to come. His usual loose trademark smirk is plastered over his face, but his eyebrows are furrowed, his eyes distant. Like the cat who’d caught the canary only to realize the canary was in fact an eagle. 

Hanekoma has known Josh for a while now. He knows Josh is a thinker, sharp as a tack and observant to a fault. But he also knows that for all his brains an big-talk, his cultivated persona of detachment and neutrality, Josh is perhaps just a little bit too idealistic. Disinterested people didn’t hold the UG of an entire city hostage for three weeks to satiate their own agendas, after all. 

Truly detached people did not last very long in Shibuya.

“I know that look, J,” he starts, slouching against the bar counter. “What’s gotcha so worked up?”

Joshua’s smirk grows bigger. So do the lines on his brow. “Expect next week's game to be _exceptionally_ interesting, Mr. H.”

Ah. Just when he’d thought he would have some more time to put up some more murals. Never a dull moment with Josh as the composer. “Yeesh. Considering you’re actually giving me a warning this time, I’d say it's already got my interest.” Hanekoma pauses and observes Josh, who in turn crosses his arms and stares right back. “Alright. How interesting? Did you put a hole in Phones’ head again? Don’t think he’d forgive you a second time, I’ll be honest. In fact-”

Josh huffs, shifting in his seat. Good old Phones card. A low blow but if there was one thing Hanekoma knew would bring a rise out of Josh it was the mention of his sacrificial lamb turned friend turned possible crush. “I didn’t do anything to Neku. Or any of his _friends_. I did however come across a mutual… acquaintance of ours.”

“Didn’t know you had acquaintances, J. People you meet while following Neku around and sulking don’t count.” Maybe Hanekoma should cut the kid some slack, but by God was he fun to tease. Teenagers. Had to love ‘em.

Josh’s smirk falls for a moment. “I didn’t meet him through Neku. Well, Neku was there, but that’s not the point. The point is he’s joining next week’s game and I expect some… interesting results.”  
Hanekoma hums. “Alright, I’ll bite. What makes this guy so special?”

“You could say that he’s not from around here.” Josh giggles and his smirk returns, teeth flashing.

“Not a Shibuyan?” Josh giggles, apparently delighted at his guess. _Oh boy._ “Alrighty, not from Shibuya. Or at least didn’t kick the bucket in our lovely corner city. Hope you didn’t grab him from the Nakano district. Those guys are off their rockers.”

“Think a little further.”

“J,” Hanekoma warns. He’s not exactly known to be a stickler for rules. Maybe that’s rubbed off on Joshua, or maybe the damn kid was just born wild. But… after the stunt they’d pulled with that three week long fiasco, the higher ups had their eyes on them. They needed to lay low. “Did you smuggle over some dead American or something?”

Josh leans in. “No, think further. Think- imperceptibly far. Think kid I met while taking a little journey to a world far, far away.”

God damnit. “Joshua,” Hanekoma rises from his position draped over the counter. Its times like these Hanekoma wishes he hadn’t cultivated his image as a cool and unflappable dude. Because oh how he would like to scream right about now. “Tell me you didn’t snatch some poor kids soul from- from some goddamn parallel dimension.”

Of course Hanekoma knew their world was not the end to all worlds. In this world perhaps, but in fact there were many dimensions all around them, each a key lined up on an endless piano playing their own notes in lieu to a greater harmony. Any self-respecting divine being was aware of that. And apparently one overly-nosy Composer. 

“Snatched is a strong word. Think more… rescued.” Josh starts, tilting his head to gaze at the ceiling. Hanekoma wants to wring him by the neck. But his smirk falls, just for a second, and Hanekoma’s internal hackles start to fall. Josh might be his boss, and a being capable of feats far beyond comprehension, but at the end of the day he was still a born human. A kid one at that. “He wasn’t technically in any dimension. He was in fact just sort of… drifting. In-between.”

Hanekoma runs one of his hands through his hair. His shoulders sag. _Guess this is happening. Now I gotta make it work._ “How’d you even notice this kid? The universe isn’t a small place.”

Josh’s smirk falls into a grin. A genuine one devoid of his trademark snark and arrogance. “He’s not an average kid, I’ll give him that.” _Far from it,_ Hanekoma thinks, his own curiosity suddenly piqued. The people Josh regarded fondly could be counted on one hand.

“So… You’re bringing this kids soul into our world. Or, well, I’m gonna assume by the look on your face you already have. And I’ll be real I have… more than a few questions. And complaints. Mostly complaints, I gotta say. But first things first- why in _Gods_ name were you in contact with someone from another dimension in the first place?” This was going to be a long story. Hanekoma knew it.

“Am I not allowed to take vacations?” Josh barks, fingers twirling in his wavy hair. “I wanted to take Neku somewhere where we could actually, you know, see each other. That isn’t a shopping center or a ramen shop. His friends sort of… well, they’re hard to get rid of.”

“Wow. I hope Phones appreciates your very, very overkill attempts at wooing him. Don’t think I’ve ever had a girl take me to an alternate dimension as a first date before.” Hanekoma figures this is divine punishment for choosing a dead fifteen year old as his best friend. 

Apparently Josh does not appreciate his wisecracks because the boy shuffles in his seat and crosses his arms. _Touchy subject, huh?_ “Back to the point. I met Sora-

Hanekoma snorts. “Sora? That’s his actual name??”

“Stop interrupting. As I was saying, Sora is a pretty unique sort of kid. The dimension he’s from has ways for mortals to travel between its worlds and even pocket dimensions. Sora’s something of a veteran explorer of his own dimension, so imagine my surprise to see him drifting dangerously close to our own. And being dead, to boot.”

“People die lots, J. That’s sort of in the whole point of mortality. Can’t save ‘em all.”

“I’m aware. But Sora was dead and drifting around in the far reaches of the universe. What kind of cruel person just lets someone drift around in oblivion for all eternity?” Josh waxes on, grin curling into a toothy smirk yet again.

“Uh, that sounds a lot like you J, if I’m being honest.” Hanekoma wasn’t born yesterday. If Josh did something he did it for a _reason_. Usually a self-benefiting one. 

Josh takes a long while to respond. When he does he stares at the windows facing out to CAT street. Shibuya never slept but CAT street was unusually subdued. A little town avenue of eden in a big city. “Lets just say I owe it to a friend of his to at least give him a fighting chance.”

Hanekoma turns to face the windows as well. “And that’s all?”

When Josh speaks his voice is quiet, as if shielding his words from enemies unseen. “I thought you knew me Mr. H. Of course I didn’t risk my head _just_ over a silly debt.” Josh exhales. “You know somethings up in Shinjuku. If I can feel it, you can feel it. And if it doesn’t just stop at Shinjuku, then this Sora kid… consider him insurance.”

“Must be one hell of a kid.” Hanekoma concedes. The thought of Shinjuku turns his stomach to ice.

“Oh he is. I mean, maybe not as interesting as Neku,” Josh starts, “but certainly one of a kind. In a boring way.”

“You think he’ll win?” Five days until the new game. Five days until Hanekoma has to pull every string he’s ever sown to keep the higher-ups from smiting Shibuya on the spot.

Josh’s phone dings in answer, and he opens it. Hanekoma watches as the kid flicks open his phone and smiles fondly at at it. The screen it paused on a text, and although Hanekoma cannot read the small font of its contents he can make out the two character senders ID which reads “Neku”. “I think,” Josh says, snapping his phone shut. “Shibuya’s going to eat him alive.”

-

(Five days come to pass and the world spins on. On a flourescent sign lit street a brown haired boy awakens with his head pressed to the pavement. He- _Sora_ his mind supplies- stands up quickly. The whir of machinery and incessant chatter of people flood his ears. From above him the colorful lights of the city- _what city_ \- block out the stars in the night sky.

He staggers to a sidewalk, blinking owlishly. Before he has a chance to compose himself a small creature manifests on the street across from him. The creature lopes towards him with purpose. He backs away, pushing through the crowd of people wholly unaware of him.

Once he is safe from the creature he collects himself. He’s Sora. From… an island,. Destiny Islands. But he’d been to other places, too. Lots of them. This city was not one of them. Memories flash and filter through his mind like phantoms. A quiet town wreathed in darkness. An eternal sunset. A pristine city of white stone. An empty chasm, desolate plains. The memories of places burn in his mind but for the life of him Sora cannot conjure the people of those places alongside them. 

_I’m forgetting something_ , Sora thinks, and his mind races. More than something. Someone- anyone. But when he tries to think of familiar faces they come up blank and shadowed, featureless and foreign. 

Sora is lost in thought when the creature returns. It takes the opportunity to strike out at him, snapping him back into reality with the feeling of a sharp burn where it had hit him. The creature lunges again and Sora swings at it because his muscles tell him to do so. What he had hoped to accomplish he does not know because there is nothing _to_ swing in his hands, and the creature winds up scoring another burning mark upon his skin.

Sora backs up a few steps and sprints once more, further into the city. He pushes past the mobs of people who do not acknowledge him until he pushes past someone of a similar height to him, their shoulders bumping as he scrambles past. “Watch it!” the person snaps, wheeling around to face him.

Sora stops in his tracks and stares at them like a deer in headlights. The kid scoffs and tilts their head. Their eyes grow wide as his own. “Oh! You can hear me?”

“You can see me?” Sora questions, taking a step towards them. The stranger nods and glances over their shoulder. 

“Were you running from those animals? The glowy ones?”

Sora follows the stranger’s gaze. “They attacked you too?” 

“Yup. Nasty little things.” The stranger turns back to him, a smile on their face. “Wanna team up till we can figure out what’s going on?”

Sora extends his hand, smiling. It feels natural. _I’m missing something,_ he thinks again as the stranger tentatively grasps his hand and shakes it weakly. “I’m Sora. Nice to meet you.” 

Unseen to the two of them a boy watches from the rooftop of a nearby building, his not-quite humanoid body wreathed in light bright enough to eclipse the glare of the full moon behind him. The boy says nothing, makes no move to assist the two children as the animals pursue them through the streets of Shibuya, until his eyes catch on a rooftop across his own- but not quite. A human donning a black cloak stands atop it with his eyes fixed to the moon imperceptible to the denizens of the world below him. _Good luck, Sora,_ the boy thinks as he lets the light around him become formless, scattering into the inky black Shibuya night sky. _You're going to need it._ )

**Author's Note:**

> mom said its my turn on the sora reapers game theory fic
> 
> (soras entry fee was predictably the memories of his friends. oh sora) this fic operates under the assumption josh (and hanekoma) are aware of the other dimensions/universes/w.e and how they can overlap. josh seems to be quite informed on the happenings of the kh worlds in ddd so i figure he can kind of get a reading on the worlds around him outside of just his own. he can also probably see into the overlaps too, re- he can see the master of masters staring up and kingdom hearts in whatever place he's standing (yozoras shinjuku i think)


End file.
